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Recursion: A Novel Hardcover – June 11, 2019
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“Gloriously twisting . . . a heady campfire tale of a novel.”—The New York Times Book Review
NAMED ONE OF THE BEST BOOKS OF THE YEAR BY Time • NPR • BookRiot
Reality is broken.
At first, it looks like a disease. An epidemic that spreads through no known means, driving its victims mad with memories of a life they never lived. But the force that’s sweeping the world is no pathogen. It’s just the first shock wave, unleashed by a stunning discovery—and what’s in jeopardy is not our minds but the very fabric of time itself.
In New York City, Detective Barry Sutton is closing in on the truth—and in a remote laboratory, neuroscientist Helena Smith is unaware that she alone holds the key to this mystery . . . and the tools for fighting back.
Together, Barry and Helena will have to confront their enemy—before they, and the world, are trapped in a loop of ever-growing chaos.
Praise for Recursion
“An action-packed, brilliantly unique ride that had me up late and shirking responsibilities until I had devoured the last page . . . a fantastic read.”—Andy Weir, #1 New York Times bestselling author of The Martian
“Another profound science-fiction thriller. Crouch masterfully blends science and intrigue into the experience of what it means to be deeply human.”—Newsweek
“Definitely not one to forget when you’re packing for vacation . . . [Crouch] breathes fresh life into matters with a mix of heart, intelligence, and philosophical musings.”—Entertainment Weekly
“A trippy journey down memory lane . . . [Crouch’s] intelligence is an able match for the challenge he’s set of overcoming the structure of time itself.”—Time
“Wildly entertaining . . . another winning novel from an author at the top of his game.”—AV Club
- Print length336 pages
- LanguageEnglish
- PublisherBallantine Books
- Publication dateJune 11, 2019
- Dimensions6.46 x 1.13 x 9.5 inches
- ISBN-101524759783
- ISBN-13978-1524759780
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From the Publisher
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Editorial Reviews
Amazon.com Review
Review
“[Crouch] has sketched out the rules for a new reality. . . . [Recursion] has a thrumming pulse that moves beyond big ideas and into their effects on a larger, more complex world.”—NPR
“[Recursion]will keep you up all night—first because you can't stop reading it, and then because you can't stop thinking about it.”—BuzzFeed
“[An] epic page-turner.”—Good Housekeeping
“Quintessential SF . . . [features] wrenching emotional moments . . . tense and vivid action scenes . . . eminently rigorous and logical methodology and science . . . And yet you will not predict anything.”—Locus
“[A] fantastic philosophical thriller [with] ingenious plotting, cinematic action and unflappable characters.”—Minneapolis StarTribune
“Recursion will leave you breathless as it dives headfirst into a strange reality.”—PopSugar
“The fragile elements of time, identity, and memory intertwine in Crouch's unforgettable new sci-fi thriller. . . . A lightning-paced, techno-fantasy that lingers long after the last, mind-numbing page.”—SyFy Wire
“The smartest, most surprising thriller of the summer.”—BookPage
“Crouch isn’t just a world-class thriller writer, he’s a Philip K. Dick for the modern age. Recursion takes mind-twisting premises and embeds them in a deeply emotional story about time and loss and grief and most of all, the glory of the human heart.”—Gregg Hurwitz, #1 internationally bestselling author of the Orphan X series
“Blake Crouch has invented his own brand of page-turner—fearlessly genre-bending, consistently surprising, and determined to explode the boundaries of what a thriller can be.”—Karin Slaughter, #1 internationally bestselling author of Pieces of Her
“Brilliant. Crouch’s innovative novels never fail to grip!”—Sarah Pekkanen, #1 New York Times bestselling co-author of The Wife Between Us and An Anonymous Girl
“A masterful mind-bender of a novel. Crouch brilliantly infuses his story with dire repercussions and unexpected moral upheaval, and leaves you wondering what you would do if you had the chance to turn back the clock.”—Mark Sullivan, #1 New York Times bestselling coauthor of the Private series and author of Beneath a Scarlet Sky
“Cutting-edge science drives this intelligent, mind-bending thriller. . . . Crouch effortlessly integrates sophisticated philosophical concepts—such as the relationship of human perceptions of what is real to actual reality—into a complex and engrossing plot. Michael Crichton’s fans won’t want to miss this one.”—Publishers Weekly (starred review)
“Completely engrossing . . . highly recommended, especially for readers who enjoy suspenseful, fast-moving, well-crafted, science-based SF.”—Library Journal (starred review)
About the Author
Excerpt. © Reprinted by permission. All rights reserved.
Barry
November 2, 2018
Barry Sutton pulls over into the fire lane at the main entrance of the Poe Building, an Art Deco tower glowing white in the illumination of its exterior sconces. He climbs out of his Crown Vic, rushes across the sidewalk, and pushes through the revolving door into the lobby.
The night watchman is standing by the bank of elevators, holding one open as Barry hurries toward him, his shoes echoing off the marble.
“What floor?” Barry asks as he steps into the elevator car.
“Forty-one. When you get up there, take a right and go all the way down the hall.”
“More cops will be here in a minute. Tell them I said to hang back until I give a signal.”
The elevator races upward, belying the age of the building around it, and Barry’s ears pop after a few seconds. When the doors finally part, he moves past a sign for a law firm. There’s a light on here and there, but the floor stands mostly dark. He runs along the carpet, passing silent offices, a conference room, a break room, a library. The hallway finally opens into a reception area that’s paired with the largest office.
In the dim light, the details are all in shades of gray. A sprawling mahogany desk buried under files and paperwork. A circular table covered in notepads and mugs of cold, bitter-smelling coffee. A wet bar stocked with expensive-looking bottles of scotch. A glowing aquarium that hums on the far side of the room and contains a small shark and several tropical fish.
As Barry approaches the French doors, he silences his phone and removes his shoes. Taking the handle, he eases the door open and slips out onto the terrace.
The surrounding skyscrapers of the Upper West Side look mystical in their luminous shrouds of fog. The noise of the city is loud and close--car horns ricocheting between the buildings and distant ambulances racing toward some other tragedy. The pinnacle of the Poe Building is less than fifty feet above—a crown of glass and steel and gothic masonry.
The woman sits fifteen feet away beside an eroding gargoyle, her back to Barry, her legs dangling over the edge.
He inches closer, the wet flagstones soaking through his socks. If he can get close enough without detection, he’ll drag her off the edge before she knows what--
“I smell your cologne,” she says without looking back.
He stops.
She looks back at him, says, “Another step and I’m gone.”
It’s difficult to tell in the ambient light, but she appears to be in the vicinity of forty. She wears a dark blazer and matching skirt, and she must have been sitting out here for a while, because her hair has been flattened by the mist.
“Who are you?” she asks.
“Barry Sutton. I’m a detective in the Central Robbery Division of NYPD.”
“They sent someone from the Robbery—?”
“I happened to be closest. What’s your name?”
“Ann Voss Peters.”
“May I call you Ann?”
“Sure.”
“Is there anyone I can call for you?”
She shakes her head.
“I’m going to step over here so you don’t have to keep straining your neck to look at me.”
Barry moves away from her at an angle that also brings him to the parapet, eight feet down from where she’s sitting. He glances once over the edge, his insides contracting.
“All right, let’s hear it,” she says.
“I’m sorry?”
“Aren’t you here to talk me off? Give it your best shot.”
He decided what he would say riding up in the elevator, recalling his suicide training. Now, squarely in the moment, he feels less confident. The only thing he’s sure of is that his feet are freezing.
“I know everything feels hopeless to you in this moment, but this is just a moment, and moments pass.”
Ann stares straight down the side of the building, four hundred feet to the street below, her palms flat against the stone that has been weathered by decades of acid rain. All she would have to do is push off. He suspects she’s walking herself through the motions, tiptoeing up to the thought of doing it. Amassing that final head of steam.
He notices she’s shivering.
“May I give you my jacket?” he asks.
“I’m pretty sure you don’t want to come any closer, Detective.”
“Why is that?”
“I have FMS.”
Barry resists the urge to run. Of course he’s heard of False Memory Syndrome, but he’s never known or met someone with the affliction. Never breathed the same air. He isn’t sure he should attempt to grab her now. Doesn’t even want to be this close. No, f*** that. If she moves to jump, he’ll try to save her, and if he contracts FMS in the process, so be it. That’s the risk you take becoming a cop.
“How long have you had it?” he asks.
“One morning, about a month ago, instead of my home in Middlebury, Vermont, I was suddenly in an apartment here in the city, with a stabbing pain in my head and a terrible nosebleed. At first, I had no idea where I was. Then I remembered . . . this life too. Here and now, I’m single, an investment banker, I live under my maiden name. But I have . . .”—she visibly braces herself against the emotion—“memories of my other life in Vermont. I was a mother to a nine-year-old boy named Sam. I ran a landscaping business with my husband, Joe Behrman. I was Ann Behrman. We were as happy as anyone has a right to be.”
“What does it feel like?” Barry asks, taking a clandestine step closer.
“What does what feel like?”
“Your false memories of this Vermont life.”
“I don’t just remember my wedding. I remember the fight over the design for the cake. I remember the smallest details of our home. Our son. Every moment of his birth. His laugh. The birthmark on his left cheek. His first day of school and how he didn’t want me to leave him. But when I try to picture Sam, he’s in black and white. There’s no color in his eyes. I tell myself they were blue. I only see black.
“All my memories from that life are in shades of gray, like film noir stills. They feel real, but they’re haunted, phantom memories.” She breaks down. “Everyone thinks FMS is just false memories of the big moments of your life, but what hurts so much more are the small ones. I don’t just remember my husband. I remember the smell of his breath in the morning when he rolled over and faced me in bed. How every time he got up before I did to brush his teeth, I knew he’d come back to bed and try to have sex. That’s the stuff that kills me. The tiniest, perfect details that make me know it happened.”
“What about this life?” Barry asks. “Isn’t it worth something to you?”
“Maybe some people get FMS and prefer their current memories to their false ones, but there’s nothing about this life I want. I’ve tried, for four long weeks. I can’t fake it anymore.” Tears carve trails through her eyeliner. “My son never existed. Do you get that? He’s just a beautiful misfire in my brain.”
Barry ventures another step toward her, but she catches him this time.
“Don’t come any closer.”
“You are not alone.”
“I am very f***ing alone.”
“I’ve only known you a few minutes, and I will be devastated if you do this. Think about the people in your life who love you. Think how they’ll feel.”
“I tracked Joe down,” Ann says.
“Who?”
“My husband. He was living in a mansion out on Long Island. He acted like he didn’t recognize me, but I know he did. He had a whole other life. He was married--I don’t know to who. I don’t know if he had kids. He acted like I was crazy.”
“I’m sorry, Ann.”
“This hurts too much.”
“Look, I’ve been where you are. I’ve wanted to end everything. And I’m standing here right now telling you I’m glad I didn’t. I’m glad I had the strength to ride it out. This low point isn’t the book of your life. It’s just a chapter.”
“What happened to you?”
“I lost my daughter. Life has broken my heart too.”
Ann looks at the incandescent skyline. “Do you have photos of her? Do you still talk with people about her?”
“Yes.”
“At least she once existed.”
There is simply nothing he can say to that.
Ann looks down through her legs again. She kicks off one of her pumps.
Watches it fall.
Then sends the other one plummeting after it.
“Ann, please.”
“In my previous life, my false life, Joe’s first wife, Franny, jumped from this building, from this ledge actually, fifteen years ago. She had clinical depression. I know he blamed himself. Before I left his house on Long Island, I told Joe I was going to jump from the Poe Building tonight, just like Franny. It sounds silly and desperate, but I hoped he’d show up here tonight and save me. Like he failed to do for her. At first, I thought you might be him, but he never wore cologne.” She smiles—wistful—then adds, “I’m thirsty.”
Barry glances through the French doors and the dark office, sees two patrolmen standing at the ready by the reception desk. He looks back at Ann. “Then why don’t you climb down from there, and we’ll walk inside together and get you a glass of water.”
“Would you bring it to me out here?”
“I can’t leave you.”
Her hands are shaking now, and he registers a sudden resolve in her eyes.
She looks at Barry. “This isn’t your fault,” she says. “It was always going to end this way.”
“Ann, no—”
“My son has been erased.”
And with a casual grace, she eases herself off the edge.
Product details
- Publisher : Ballantine Books; First Edition, 3rd printing (June 11, 2019)
- Language : English
- Hardcover : 336 pages
- ISBN-10 : 1524759783
- ISBN-13 : 978-1524759780
- Item Weight : 1.25 pounds
- Dimensions : 6.46 x 1.13 x 9.5 inches
- Best Sellers Rank: #12,473 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)
- #112 in Technothrillers (Books)
- #627 in Science Fiction Adventures
- #1,975 in Suspense Thrillers
- Customer Reviews:
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About the author
Blake Crouch is a bestselling novelist and screenwriter. His novels include the New York Times bestseller Dark Matter, and the internationally bestselling Wayward Pines trilogy, which was adapted into a television series for FOX. Crouch also created the TNT show Good Behavior, based on his Letty Dobesh novellas. His latest book is Recursion, a sci-fi thriller about memory, and will be published in June 2019. He lives in Colorado.
To learn more about what he is doing, check out his website, www.blakecrouch.com, follow him on Twitter - @blakecrouch1 - or on Facebook at https://www.facebook.com/blakecrouchauthor
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• After the initial two chapters, the story lags just a bit as the background, relationships, and environmental setting are built. But pay attention because key elements are introduced here that come back into play in the finale. At first, I didn’t completely understand the finale, thinking the author had cheated and gone against his world’s rules. (I detest authors that rely upon deus ex machina solutions or the breaking of rules they’d set up earlier in their story’s universe.) But in looking over those “background building” chapters, I see that he did not, and I am suitably impressed with what he’s built as a solid, very believable story. Also, I’ve never read about a time-travel model like the one presented here, so I believe the author’s take on a classic sci-fi theme is unique.
• The characters are richly detailed, their dialogue sharp and cutting. For instance, the way Crouch uses dialogue to show nuances in the strained relationship of the male main character (MMC) Barry Sutton and his ex-wife Julia adds so much realism and depth to his character, you can feel his pain, even though you don’t (immediately) know why he has so much pain. As the story develops and we learn more about Barry & Julia, we come to understand their pain and feel so much more empathy for them. These are not simply cardboard characters created to forward a pre-determined plot. No, they are complex persons struggling with very real-life situations, and that realism adds a wonderful thickness to the story that many sci-fi tales do not. Crouch’s descriptions are succinct while adding even more layers of complexity, tiny nods to nostalgia, loss, and wistfulness that give marvelous depth to these people. These character traits are integral to understanding WHAT moves them to take drastic action and WHY.
• The female main character (FMC) Helena Smith is no less complicated in her race to save her mother from the ravages of Alzheimer’s disease, seemingly unwilling to stop at nothing to attain that goal. But when she is pushed over the edge by her boss (a principal supporting character), Marcus Slade, we start to learn what Helena is truly made of. She struggles with classic dramatic questions of purpose, goals/aspirations vs. unintended consequences, and deep, deep sorrow. But you really will have no idea of Helena’s mettle until you reach the explosive conclusion, which was one of the best in science fiction I’ve read in a very long time.
• I love time-travel stories, and this one did not disappoint. I will NOT spoil the ending or any of the action leading up to it, but WOW! You will be exhausted mentally (and perhaps even physically) after reaching the end. Kudos, Mr. Crouch, on such a well-done job, from start to finish. The first quarter was a little sluggish, but I understand it’s necessary to show how the “memory chair” is built and the many failings Helena and Marcus had to overcome. My only criticism is that some of that could’ve been scaled back. But by making me wait for the breakthrough that ultimately comes, you did give me a good perspective on how much they (and their colleagues) struggled to get to that discovery. The descriptions of world-changing events in the last quarter of the book are stunning in their detail, so real you’d swear you’d lived them but thankful you haven’t.
• BASIC PREMISE (no spoilers): This unique story starts with Detective Barry Sutton investigating a suicide linked to an emerging “false memory syndrome” epidemic, an investigation that eventually leads him to horrific discoveries of his own. Meanwhile, neuroscientist Helena Smith struggles to build a “memory chair” to store people’s memories in the hopes of using them later to reignite any lost memories in people suffering from Alzheimer’s, like her mother. Helena’s boss, billionaire Marcus Slade, provides her with anything and everything she asks for, regardless of expense. In a remote, idyllic setting, Helena accomplishes her goal. But Slade makes an additional stunning discovery that threatens to unravel reality.
• WARNING: As you enter the last quarter of the book, things will get even crazier than you’d think they could. Some of it may make you very sad about mankind and our collective future. But stick with it and try not to get confused by the multiple timelines. The ending is so worth it.
• I’m on to buying my next Blake Crouch novel, “Black Matter.” Can't wait to read more of his writing.
This is not your normal time travel Syfy story . This novel is based on our memories and how one genius physicist (Helena) creates a computer program to map memories that can assist that person to return to that time… But of course like all time travel stories there is always a hitch. This novel has so many sub plots that are full of detailed back story.
This a must read for anyone who enjoys sci-fi, thrillers and/or excitement.. Can’t wait for my next novel by Blake Crouch
I loved everything about this book. The story line kept you guessing to the point that you are never certain if it will end well or not. The characters and dialogue are so expertly rendered to the point that they seem real. Everything is so well done that one could believe this really happened, unbeknownst to the rest of the world. That statement will make much more sense once you've read it.
My only complaint is that I wish I knew what Barry said at the end, though I guess I can accept that that part is left to our imaginations. I highly recommend this book and I'm excited to read more by this author.
SPOILERS AHEAD
...it really just becomes a time travel thing. 12 monkeys / groundhogs day (30 years) kinda jam. Scientist invents some chair with half baked science stuff with a good heart, but it ends up allowing people to go back in time an change things... but then at a time-point, everyone gets the memories from the alternate time lines. So peoples brains get jammed with multiple timelines of memories.
Eventually the tech intended for good gets used for bad and this sets our protagonist(s ?) on a 30 year groundhogs day thing to try and fix it.
There's always so many holes you can poke in time travel stuff though. Why does she always wait till its basically the apocalypse and her skin is melting off before almost just barely making the jump back one more time? I mean, she knows its coming - she literally knows the future point - so why not jump back like... a day before the apocalypse? Save some melting skin?
Also at a certain point, she knows so much about the world she should just like, I dunno, take it over in that 30 years through wealth and basically knowing everything about the future. That's one way to prevent stereotypical American enemy countries from attacking. Just... take em over? I'm sure there's a way.
This groundhogs day thing that is bugging me is only like, the last 5th of the book. Before that it's separated in to somewhat disjointed other parts that feel all over the map.
So for me, the logline, the premise pitched for the book is better than what it actually is. It is short and competency written though, so if you are the type that just likes action/sci-fi stuff with little regard for logic, it might be a fun read!